by Edwin Dasso
“The digital pictures I have of Rob Fackrell are too dark and don’t transmit well. I’ll be receiving additional pictures either later today or tomorrow, and then text you a copy.”
“Thank you, Mr. Rice.”
The conversation left Tori worrying about Fackrell and wondering what he intended to do next that could spur Brandon into returning to the States. Will he try to kidnap me? If he was successful, Brandon would rush back. Until the investigator or the person Brandon has tracking phone calls comes up with something they can take to the police, I need to be extra vigilant around strangers.
Unable to concentrate on her work, Tori thought about the open house she planned to attend the following night and wondered if she’d be safe going there alone. She had Googled the address and knew it was about a thirty-minute drive from Brandon’s apartment. The invitation didn’t indicate a “plus one,” though she doubted it would be a problem if she showed up with someone. After Keith’s behavior the prior night, she had no intention of inviting him. On top of that, he had already said he’d be out of town for a couple of days.
Tori decided to call Mandy.
“Hey,” Mandy answered. “You having a slow day at work?”
Tori understood that comment since that’s what she also said to Mandy when she called her during work hours. “A little. Did you talk Max into moving the barbeque to Sunday?”
“Yep. It’s a good thing too. Max heard a magazine food critic might be visiting his restaurant Friday night so he needs to be there. Had it not been moved, I would’ve had two choices—call everyone and postpone or do the cooking. Most of our friends would rather do the former. Guess they don’t think I cook as good as hubby.”
“Well, he is a chef.”
“Yeah, but I’m pretty damn good at shoving fancy toothpicks into the mini hot dogs in Beanee Weenees.”
“You’ve always had a talent with little wieners, Mandy. Hey, remember the Friday evening open house—the guy showing off his home Brandon designed—I told you about?”
“Between juggling Max and Rylee’s calendars, it slipped my mind.”
“Well, would you like to go with me?”
“You don’t want to take Keith?”
“No.” Tori took a deep breath. “Do you recall my friend Ashley?”
“I’ve only met her once. Wasn’t it at her party that you met Keith?”
“Yes, it was,” Tori said, and then filled in Mandy about Ashley’s accident and her hospital visit.
“You think they had a thing going before her crash?”
“That’s kind of what it sounded like to me. I’m going to Keith’s house on Saturday night for dinner. He’s cooking. I’d already thought about breaking up with him, even though we’re not exclusive. Something neither one of us has ever discussed. I believed he was holding off in the romance department because he was still pining for his ex-wife, but after she stormed into the restaurant last night, he physically yanked her out of there. It wasn’t a pleasant scene. It looked like he definitely wanted her out of his life, not in it. If Ashley and Keith were involved before her accident, maybe she’s the reason he’s holding off. At any rate, I don’t see our relationship going anywhere.”
“I doubt that’s the reason. If he’s hung up on her, why wouldn’t he go see her?”
“Beats me. Maybe he was with her when the accident happened and he’s feeling guilty.”
“That doesn’t make sense. The accident had to have happened after you met him. He asked you out at her party.”
“Well, she wasn’t there when Keith and I were talking.”
“So, he’s dating the hostess while hitting on you. That sounds more like a guy who likes to play around. One who’d jump in bed with you at his first opportunity.”
“Yeah. I don’t get it. Anyway, I intend to ask him about Ashley on Saturday. I need to attempt to get some work done today. Do you want to go tomorrow night?”
“Sure. Rylee’s been begging for time with his favorite babysitter. He’s only four, but her pretty face and long golden-brown hair has my tow-headed boy mesmerized. What time?”
“I’ll pick you up at seven.”
6
Expecting to see Jerry standing by the door to greet residents as they entered, relief washed over Tori when she saw Charlie smiling at her. Since Jerry always gave her an uneasy feeling, she hoped he’d taken another position. “Is Jerry off for the evening?”
“No. He had an errand to run. He’ll be back later.”
As she walked toward the elevator, she heard another resident address Charlie. “I seem to have lost my keys. Has anyone turned in a set?”
“Yes. One was found…”
Charlie’s voice died out when the elevator doors closed behind Tori.
Reaching the apartment, Tori put her take-out dinner on the counter, sank down onto the couch, and punched Brandon’s number into her cell phone.
He answered on the second ring. “Hi, Tori. I’m meeting my client in twenty minutes, so this call has to be short. Did you find out anything from the investigator?”
“A little. Fackrell claims your car was illegally parked the night of the accident and that position contributed to his wife hitting it. The investigator said Fackrell told the police about that, but they just brushed it off. It wasn’t even included in the accident report.”
“This is the first I’ve heard about that. I wasn’t ticketed for being illegally parked.”
“Was your car illegally parked?”
“That night, a friend, who didn’t have a car, needed to run an errand and borrowed mine. That person parked it on the street instead of in the parking lot.”
“Did you tell the police that?”
“Tori, there wasn’t any reason to mention my friend to the police. Even if my car was illegally parked, it was clearly visible to anyone driving along that road. Witnesses gave statements that Stella Fackrell swerved all over the street before the crash. Her blood alcohol level was three times over the legal limit.”
“We talked about that accident often and you never once said you hadn’t parked the car on the street. Why?”
“I didn’t see any point in dragging a friend into the mess surrounding the accident. That person wasn’t responsible for Mrs. Fackrell’s actions.”
“Is this friend a woman?”
“Yes, but she’s only a friend. Nothing more.”
Is he telling the truth or is she the woman on the video that mysteriously disappeared?
“Tori, please believe me.” His soft tone sounded grave.
Wanting to believe him, but feeling skeptical, Tori changed the subject. “Did your guy who’s tapping your phone find out anything new today?”
Brandon exhaled. “Yes. Another call came through early this morning. Probably when you were getting ready to go to work. It was placed from a public phone near Fackrell’s auto restoration shop. That further supports our scenario that Fackrell is behind the calls.”
“What’s the name of his shop?”
“I don’t want you putting yourself in harm’s way by checking it out.”
“Brandon, the investigator’s client still claims she’s seen me with him. I want to know what he looks like. All I want to do is drive by. I’m not planning on stopping and visiting.”
“Did you ask the investigator for a picture?”
“Yes. The pictures he has of clean-shaven Fackrell are blurry. When he gets a good one, he’ll send it to me.”
“Can you forward it to me?” A phone rang in the background.
“Yes.”
“The front desk is calling. My client is probably here. I’ll call you tomorrow. Set the alarm.”
“Always do.” Clicking off, Tori wondered if he thought she was so forgetful that he felt it was necessary to remind her to set the alarm each time they talked on the phone.
After quickly wolfing down her dinner, Tori pulled out her laptop and searched for Rob Fackrell. She found several Robert Fackrells. Some had Facebo
ok pages. Tapping on them, she found one who lived in Boston and worked at an auto body shop, but it didn’t say he owned it. The name of the place wasn’t included. His picture displayed a 1956 Chevy coupe, not his face.
Frustrated, she stuck her computer back into its bag and set it on the floor next to Brandon’s desk. As she turned to go back to the couch, an envelope partially sticking out from under a notepad caught her eye. Curious about what Brandon had hidden there, Tori pulled it out. Seeing it wasn’t sealed and didn’t have any writing on the outside, she opened it and pulled out a picture.
Her heart sank when she saw Brandon with his arm around an attractive blonde. As her eyes became moist, something about the woman seemed familiar. Have I ever met her? While she continued mulling that over, her eyes drifted to Brandon. From the way he was looking at the blonde, it appeared he cared for her. His stance, expression, and the clothing he wore reminded Tori of a picture in Brandon’s bedroom.
Carrying the photo, she wandered into his bedroom. That picture no longer hung on the wall, but the hook remained. I saw it the first day I was here. I don’t always set the alarm when I leave. Has Brandon given someone else a key to his place? Tori had that same picture at her place, but instead of displaying it, she had put it in a drawer along with all the pictures of Brandon.
Thinking, or maybe hoping, the picture in her hand had been Photoshopped, she put the picture back into the envelope, stuck it in her purse, and headed to her car.
A half an hour later, she pulled into her dimly lit driveway. No lights shined through the windows and only the fixture above the garage door illuminated her walkway. Tori climbed out of the car, went to the front door, and unlocked it. As she opened it, the buzzing sound of the alarm blared. She flipped on the switch next to her, but no lights came on. The glow of the moon shining through the floor-to-ceiling windows gave enough light for her to dodge around ladders and construction tools as she made her way to the alarm system. Right before reaching it, she stumbled over some paint cans, banged her arm against one, and landed face down on a tarp. She pulled herself up and tapped in the alarm code.
Sighing and rubbing her arm, she slowly moved around the obstacles to the front door. Tori went and retrieved a flashlight from her glove compartment. Moving back toward the house, she heard leaves rustling without a breeze in the air. She picked up her pace and sprinted to the front door, hurried inside, and locked it. Cautiously peering through her window’s edge, she scanned a clump of trees closest to the noise. Everything looked calm—no branches swayed. Guessing the rustling was caused by a small animal, she pushed on her flashlight and avoided the windows as she carefully moved to the stairwell.
Tori climbed up to the second floor and flipped a switch. Again, no lights snapped on. Unlike downstairs, there was no disarray—no ladders and paint cans. Most of the furniture hadn’t been disturbed. She stepped into her master bedroom and opened the top drawer of Brandon’s former dresser, the one he’d used while they were married. Tori thumbed through the framed pictures until she found her copy of the photo that had hung on Brandon’s apartment wall. She took the picture out of her purse and compared the two. Brandon’s stance, clothing, and expression were identical. The only difference was he had his arm around her and not the blonde. Photoshopped. She dropped on the bed, stunned. Brandon always claimed he had been a faithful husband. Did I have it all wrong?
Then it suddenly dawned on her where she had seen the woman before—in the video with Brandon. Had that also been digitally altered? Why? That video, the emails, the text messages, and the late night calls from a woman had caused Tori to believe he was cheating on her. Who would want to destroy our marriage? Carrie, his secretary? Carrie had often flirted with Brandon in front of Tori. Brandon had brushed it off by telling her Carrie flirted with everyone and she was a darn good secretary. Carrie had left town to take care of her sick mother while Brandon was away. Was that a ruse? Is she behind all this?
A loud crashing sound echoed through the house, interrupting Tori’s thoughts.
Did Fackrell follow me? Fearing he or another intruder had entered the house, Tori charged to the bedroom door, locked it, and grabbed her cell phone. She quickly punched in 9-1-1.
“What is your emergency?”
“Someone just broke into my house. I’m upstairs alone.” With a trembling voice and feeling irritated for not resetting the alarm after retrieving her flashlight, Tori proceeded to give her address.
“A patrol car is on the way. It’ll be there in about ten minutes. Can you lock yourself in a bedroom or bathroom?”
“I’ve already locked the bedroom door. I’m going to lock myself in the master bathroom.”
“Don’t hang up until the police arrive, and speak up if you hear someone attempting to enter your space through a locked door.”
Holding the flashlight in front of her, Tori stepped on a tarp as she entered her bathroom. After locking that door, she scanned the room and saw the new vanity, but the counter and sinks still needed to be installed. The bursting of pipes in that room had damaged everything below it. The pipes under both the kitchen sink and a guest bathroom had also malfunctioned adding to the flood causing the first floor to sustain significantly more damage than the second floor. It appeared all those pipes had ruptured shortly after Tori had left for a funeral in California. Since the house was only eight years old, the plumber couldn’t understand how that could’ve happened.
With her ear to the door, she intently listened for any sound, but didn’t hear a peep before the siren blared and blinking lights flashed through the frosted bathroom window. She unlocked the door, inched it open, and aimed the flashlight at the bedroom door. Seeing it was still closed, she unlocked it and walked into the hallway as pounding on her front door echoed through the house.
The glow of blinking lights coming through the floor-to-ceiling windows lit up the space below her. Tori ran down the stairs and opened the door to a police officer.
“Are you okay, Miss?”
“Yes.” Tori peered out the door and looked at two police cruiser in her driveway.
“We’re checking the grounds. Can I search the interior?”
“Certainly.” As the officer entered, she explained the water damage and told him she wasn’t living there while the construction crew worked on repairing the house.
While the officer wandered through the house, checking for any sign of an intruder, Tori went back upstairs, put away the framed pictures, and flung her purse over her shoulder. She strolled through the main floor and noticed a tipped-over ladder next to some paint cans in the spot where she had stumbled and fallen. Tori wondered if she had left the ladder in a tilted position from her fall and then it had eventually crashed to the floor when she was upstairs. Had I dialed 9-1-1 for no reason?
When the search was finished Tori set the alarm, locked the door behind her, and climbed into her Camry before the patrol cars drove away. As she pulled out of the driveway right behind them, Tori saw headlights of a car across the street flip on. Swinging her eyes between the windshield, the rear view mirror, and the side mirror, she kept track of the vehicle following her. She knew it was a dark color, but the car didn’t get close enough to her Camry for her to make out anything else about it. After turning onto a busy street, she lost track of the car, but she wasn’t convinced that it wasn’t still following her. Am I in danger or just paranoid because of Fackrell?
Staying on high alert, Tori swung into Brandon’s apartment building’s parking terrace without spotting any dark vehicles that appeared to be on her tail.
Jerry greeted Tori as she walked into the lobby.
Although he always seemed friendly, she couldn’t shake an uneasy feeling that drifted through her each time she saw him, a sensation that had been amplified the night she’d received the black rose. Why have I immediately taken a dislike of the new doorman?
7
Drinking her morning coffee, Tori had the urge to call Brandon, but stifled it as h
er eyes fixed on the clock. She wanted to know if he had given anyone else a key to his apartment, and talk to him about the missing picture in his bedroom along with the Photoshopped picture. Tori decided to call him right after work, thinking he could also fill her in on the house he had designed for Wesley Crane. Having some prior knowledge might help her start a conversation with the owner at the open house.
Ever since she realized the photo in the envelope had been digitally altered, she was haunted by the thought that she could’ve wrongly blamed Brandon for having an affair. A lump formed in her throat when the sad image of Brandon flashed into her mind of the day they met with their attorneys in a conference room to sign their divorce papers—ending a ten-year marriage. He had reached across the table for her hand. She had immediately pulled it out of his reach. His eyes dimmed when he said, “Is this really what you want, Tori?” And without even batting an eye, she had snapped, “Yes,” as her heart ached.
All the phone calls from a woman, all the supposed meetings at various hotels, and all the times she couldn’t reach Brandon, sprang into her head, but the final straw was the video, a video that had vanished. Brandon had sworn that he’d never cheated on her. If Brandon had been telling the truth, and someone wanted to break us up, then that person succeeded because I didn’t have enough faith and trust in my husband to believe him. Am I the one who really ruined our marriage?
Her cell phone rang, snapping Tori out of her thoughts. She picked it up and saw “No Caller ID” and decided not to answer it.
Realizing she had less than a half an hour to get ready for work, Tori rushed into the bathroom. Twenty minutes later, she had showered, dressed, styled her hair, and applied all makeup except lipstick. She grabbed her phone to put it in her purse and noticed she had an unheard message. Tori clicked on it and saw that “No Caller ID” had left it. Still, she listened and heard nothing but heavy breathing coming through the airwaves. She licked her dry lips, alarmed that the breather had somehow acquired her private cell number. Tori worried the breather might not be calling Brandon’s number anymore and that meant it would be harder, if not impossible, for whoever was tapping Brandon’s calls to locate the caller.